“Artists have used Grand Theft Auto V as a canvas for years. Now, protesters are doing the same.” by Hart Fowler, 11 February, 2020.
Realism, it turns out, can invite the expression of tensions that may not fully manifest in the real world.
alan butler
Alan Butler, Sturtevant/a_m_f_skidrow_01 Finite Infinite, 2018
SITUATION #129: Alan Butler, Sturtevant/a_m_f_skidrow_01 Finite Infinite, 2018
part of Fotomuseum Winterthur SITUATIONS programme.
In Sturtevant/a_m_f_skidrow_01 Finite Infinite, a short video loop portraying a non-player character (NPC) from a computer game is projected on a rotating beamer in the installation space. The installation builds on Butler’s previous work, Down and Out in Los Santos. There, the artist embarked on a journey through the social landscape of the video game Grand Theft Auto V to document the lives of homeless NPCs in the virtual city of Los Santos. One of the characters he encountered is at the centrepiece of his new work: a homeless NPC that bears a striking resemblance to conceptual artist Sturtevant. The character is transformed into a hybrid, computational entity, half human-looking, yet resembling a dog running endlessly in circles. By directing our gaze to the characters that inhabit the uncanny borders of non/human, the artist challenges the viewer to rethink anthropomorphic representation and consider these digital entities and bots as autonomous creatures that do not subjugate to a human hierarchy.
Sturtevant/a_m_f_skidrow_01 Finite Infinite is accompanied by the online video essay Mondo Cane.
source: https://www.fotomuseum.ch/en/explore/situations/154957
Gut Gespielt – exhibition
GUT GESPIELT,
der Mensch und sein Avatar (Kuratorin Josiane Imhasly)
*ALTEFABRIK,
Klaus-Gebert-Str. 5,
8640 Rapperswil-Jona (Switzerland)
Exposition 27.01 – 04.03.2018
GUT GESPIELT,
der Mensch und sein Avatar
GUT GESPIELT erzählt von der Beziehung zwischen SpielerIn und Spielfigur und fragt, inwiefern das Ich im Spiel nicht ein anderes ist, sondern etwas mit mir zu tun hat. Vom imaginierten Alter Ego beim Schattenboxen über die verkleideten Cosplayer und Furries bis hin zum Charakter im Videogame: Der Mensch steht in einem spannungsreichen Verhältnis zwischen Spielwelt und Realität.
Vernissage le vendredi 26 janvier 2017 à 19h
Exposition du 27 janvier au 4 mars 2018
Heure d’ouverture: mercredi de 12h à 18h et samedi-dimanche de 11h à 17h
Avec les travaux de:
THIBAULT BRUNET
ALAN BUTLER
COLLECTIF_FACT
JOSEPH DELAPPE
KATJA LOHER
GABRIELA LÖFFEL
MILTOS MANETAS
SHUSHA NIEDERBERGER
KLAUS PICHLER
CHRISTIAN ROTHACHER
REMO STOLLER
PILVI TAKALA
FERNANDO VILLELA
*ALTEFABRIK,
Klaus-Gebert-Str. 5,
8640 Rapperswil-Jona
source: http://www.kurator.ch/20172018-josiane-imhasly/ausstellungen/gut-gespielt/
2 x 26 Gasoline Stations
“Twentysix Gasoline Stations in Grand Theft Auto V” by M. Earl Williams, 2014
screenshot of book spread as seen on http://www.blurb.com/b/5454103-twentysix-gasoline-stations, © M. Earl Williams
26 Gasoline Stations was a book and conceptual photography series created by Ed Ruscha in 1963. In my version I take a 4X5 view camera and point it at my T.V. screen while I explore the virtual world of Los Santos in the video game Grand Theft Auto V. This world is created to mimic the real world of California and most specifically the city of Los Angeles. As I visit this world from my couch I wait for something to catch my eye as familiar or visually interesting just like we do when we photograph in the real world. By relating back to this series of travel photographs but having the entire travel log take place in a virtual world of a video game; the work speaks to an idea of another reality in which we occupy and participate in simulated experience. When looking at a photograph the viewer receives visual stimuli of the mind that in return triggers a feeling that is most likely made up of an experience they may have had in the past. This process is not unlike the video game world that is created as an expression of an idealist reality, whose purpose is to provide you with simulated occurrences. This connection between these two mediums may be why the digital age has become so fascinated with them both.
source: http://www.mearlwilliams.com/gasoline_stations#1
“Twentysix Gasoline Stations” by Alan Butler, 2017
two page spread from book © Alan Butler
This work is a simulacrum of Ed Ruscha’s 1962 publication of the same name. The photographic panels in this version have been produced during drives around the city of Los Santos and Blaine County – the virtual world that makes up the video game Grand Theft Auto 5. Using out-of-the-box technology within the game, I have produced a version of the seminal photography artifact that accepts GTAV as an exploitable corporate reality, akin to the signs and images that make up our own world.
source: http://www.alanbutler.info/twentysix-gasoline-stations/
in-game photography 